"The more I find out, the less I know."
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Weather at the Frozen North
This is my personal blog. My professional blog is The Customer Service Survey I've written a book called Gourmet Customer Service. You can buy it on Amazon. (in)Frequently Asked Questions AIM Screen Name: DFNfrozenNorth
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Last Updated: Aug 07, 2008 03:30 PM
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Thursday - January 15, 2004 at 03:37 AM inTo Infinity....And....
As I figured , the Bush Moon/Mars plan is basically easy promises and little concrete in the near term. NASA will get an extra $1 billion over five years under Bush's proposal, hardly enough to even begin thinking about going to the Moon, much less a manned mission to Mars. Even that is subject to the budget process, and is therefore likely to disappear before becoming reality.
The cynic in me says that this is just an attempt to win cheap political points with the Star Trek crowd (of which I am one) by promising something Bush knows he'll never have to deliver. The frustrating thing is that I'm a great believer in the manned space program. Eventually, I believe there must be a permanent, self-sustaining human presence outside Earth's atmosphere. Manifest destiny, eggs in one basket, to boldly go, and so forth. Part of our humanity is the urge to expand our reach beyond our current limitations. Unfortunately, with the current state of affairs, we're never going to get there. Bush I proposed going to Mars, and choked when he saw what it would cost. Now Bush II is proposing we go to Mars, as long as he's not the one to spend the money. C'mon, guys, let's get real and stop yanking our chains. America's manned space program doesn't need another set of promises and empty visions. What it needs is a real goal, with a real timeline, and real money to get there. In our system, it is unlikely that we can sustain the funding for any major project for more than a decade, so that needs to be the timeline. Either give us something real, or stop playing games. Posted at 03:37 AM | Permalink | | | |